Update: Alleged Dropbox Hack Is A Hoax, Website Is Back Up

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Update: The alleged hack against Dropbox is looking more like is an elaborate hoax, timed perfectly with the website’s incidental outage. As security researcher Wesley Mcgrew points out, the emails supposedly stolen from Dropbox have been found elsewhere on the web and a known Anonymous Twitter account is officially denying their involvement. Moreover, it seems the group claiming credit may incur the wrath of Anonymous, because they said the attack was in the name of fallen internet activist, Aaron Swartz.

Dropbox sent us this updated response, confirming the hoax:

“Dropbox site is back up.

In regards to claims of “leaked user information” – this is a hoax. This is not Dropbox data. The list was published 12/9/13 at: http://pastebin.com/64PAAV1c

Today’s outage was caused during internal maintenance, and was not caused by external factors. We apologize for any inconvenience.”

Our original story below:

Popular backup service Dropbox is offline and the hacktivist contingent, Anonymous, is claiming credit. “BREAKING NEWS: We have just compromised the @Dropbox Website http://bit.ly/1cMlbvt #hacked #compromised,” tweeted an alleged Anonymous Twitter account.

Dropbox seems to be denying their website was hacked: “We are aware of an issue currently affecting the Dropbox site. We have identified the cause, which was the result of an issue that arose during routine internal maintenance, and are working to fix this as soon as possible. We apologize for any inconvenience,” went a company blog post. [Update: Dropbox and has called us and is explicitly denying they have been hacked]

If they were, indeed, hacked it’s not clear who is ultimately responsible. Another hacktivist group, 1775sec, is also claiming credit:

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OverviewDropbox's mission is to provide a home for everyone's most important information and bring it to life. They make it easy for hundreds of millions of people to access, share, and collaborate on their files so they can be more productive — at home and at work.
Dropbox is headquartered in San Francisco, with offices in Austin, New York, Seattle, Dublin (Ireland), Herzliya (Israel), London (United …